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The Sunday Mail, 19 July 1992
ALTHOUGH it has taken some stand developers at Nzvimbo Growth Point, almost two-and-a-half years to work on their stands, the Chiweshe District Council will give them more time before repossessing them because it does not want to chase away investors.
A senior council official told The Sunday Mail that persistent shortage of building materials had slowed down progress and the lack of money from banks had made the situation worse.
“We all know that there is a shortage of building materials and so as a council, we have to give these people time to develop their stands.
“It does not make much sense to rush to repossess and then reallocate to other people who will face the same problems again.
“Banks are not giving money and people do not have money to develop stands without support from banks,” he said.
Earlier this year, the council asked all those who had been given stands as from January 1990 to come to explain how they had got the stands.
Some people smelt a scandal, but the senior official said the council only wanted to have correct information as the person who had allocated stands had resigned from the council.
“The investigation was to check how many people had applied for stands and how many had been allocated. We established that 43 had been allocated stands but these were having problems.
“The Department of Physical Planning is going to survey more stands here and so we will need more commercial and industrial developers.”
The senior official was not happy with the pace of development at the growth point with virtually no industrial development.
LESSONS FOR TODAY
Economic growth is the foundation of all successful developments, hence the need for rural development councils to be open for business that bring in investors.
Growth is mainly driven by private sector business functioning in a market environment.
The creation of a safe environment characterised by low levels of crime is made possible by emphasising on transparency in the selling and allocation of council land by authorities. Once a place has a chaotic land acquisition, investor confidence is dented.
The development of integrated human settlements connected to economic opportunities brings sustainable development to rural communities.
The growth of the community through empowering individuals, strengthening families and connecting communities is achieved through opening up rural councils for investors and development.
Online Reporter